Well, it’s been a whirlwind six months (or just over) since the decision was made to put this into play, and now here we are! Goulburn Steel hooks officially launched on the 1st of October with our first six models of barbless fly tying tying hooks.
There’s been plenty of positivity around the launch of the brand, and we’re thankful to all those who have reached out to offer well-wishes and support. As you can probably guess, this has been a massive undertaking. Putting together an entire brand campaign for a new business is a big job, and that’s just what you see on the surface. The bringing together of a hook range, a product, as such, is what it’s all about, and we have been lucky to have great peopel to work with both locally and offshore.
Our packaging is designed, printed and created here in the Goulburn Valley. It’s a labour intensive process, but one that allows us to ensure the product looks the way we want on flyshop’s walls. We’re happy with how the first lot look, though we will make subtle changes to increase productivity in the process on the next print run. We also have slightly different packaging designed and proofed for the upcoming releases of our Carp Fly Hook and our Barbed Trout Fly Hook ranges. That way, you’ll know what you’re looking at on the shelves, without having to read product descriptions.
But, before the packaging on any production run, ALL the hooks are inspected for quality control here in Australia. That’s right, we go over EVERY SINGLE hook by eye to weed out the failures. Of which there are very few due. This is in part due to our short production runs, keeping quality as high as possible in each batch. It is also thanks to the exceptional team we are working with in Korea who manufacture our hooks to order. Being a factory that manufactures hooks for some of the biggest and longest running brands in fly tying, we know they offer experience and professionalism like no other. We have a close working relationship with out production manager who is in touch every step of the way through the process from design, to samples and right through to delivery of the finished product. This give us the confidence in our product, that is backed up in the quality control process untdertaken here in Australia..
With that, at the time of writing this, I can announce that we’re well into our second production schedule, with more hooks due to ship at the end of the month. In this shipment, we will see additional stock of popular sizes to back up our existing models. There will also be additional sizes for certain models in the range. So, you’ll see a size #12 in the 8246 Streamer, as well as a size #18 in both the 4214 Dry Fly and the 6224 Nymph hooks.
Also in this production schedule, we will have some additional models in the Barbless Trout Hooks. We can confirm the following two models will be added to the range :
5241 Barbless Jig Wide . This hook features a wide gape for added bite when fishing deep, as a point of difference to the sleeker 5230. This is backed by a heavier gauge wire to aid in strength. Whilst there is a trend in many competition hooks hooks to go wide and fine, we wanted to offer you a hook that holds up on larger fish, As the gape increases, the propensity for the hook opening goes up too. So, a tougher, heavier wire has been employed here to give you confidence on every hook-up.
3259 Barbless Pupa. This is a wider gape grub style hook to compliment the 3223, with a more rounded bend and a more pronounced flat section on the shank. With a straight eye, and short shank, this hook is going to prove popular for a range of uses, not least of all as a pupae/grub hook. This will be another hook that blurs the line between dry fly and nymph in it’s applications. For those of you who have been asking about a Klinkhamer style hook, this is going to tick that box for you in no uncertain terms!
Finally, we will have a new line of hooks that is a little left of centre, and something we have wanted to do for a long time now. This November, Goulburn Steel are launching a range of Carp Fly Hooks, a first for the Australian market. We’ve taken the guesswork out of finding the right hook when flyfishing for carp. This will begin with three models, in several appropriate sizes, designed for a range of carp fly patterns.
Testing of sample hooks for this range has been continuing over the winter months, and into Spring, with excellent results. With this, we are confident in bringing this range of hooks to the Australian market knowing that they will stand up against the biggest of fish, whilst offering the fly tyer and fly fisherman a size, shape and profile that delivers on what they need.
There will be more news to follow on these new models in the coming weeks as we get closer to their release.
For now, if you’re a store that is interested in becoming a Goulburn Steel dealer, please get in touch today. If you’re a commercial fly tyer looking to joing our Commercial Tying Program, send us an email and tell us about your business.
For those of you tying your own flies to fish, or simply for enjoyment at the vise, we hope you love our products as much as we do.